The real reason the DOJ is making a plea deal offer to Trump adviser Peter Navarro

So here’s something no one saw coming, but perhaps we should have. Historically, the DOJ loves cutting plea deals with federal criminal defendants as opposed to going to trial. In fact the DOJ loves building criminal cases so overwhelmingly comprehensive, defendants realize they have no hope at trial, and decide to just cut a deal instead. Now it turns out the DOJ has offered a plea deal to Donald Trump adviser Peter Navarro in his contempt of Congress case.

The DOJ offered to drop one of the two contempt charges against Navarro if he pleaded guilty to the other, according to CBS News. Navarro, who keeps going on television and making frantic and incoherent threats, has reportedly rejected the offer.

But it’s interesting, to say the least, that the DOJ made this deal. Although this DOJ generally tries to keep everything a secret, there was never any indication that it offered any sort of plea deal to Steve Bannon on his contempt charges. And if Bannon had received such a deal and rejected it, wouldn’t he have gone public with it, so he could brag to his base about how brave he is for having rejected it?

It’s enough to make you wonder what’s really going on. Not only does the DOJ generally love cutting plea deals ahead of trial, it would be particularly motivated in a probe like this one, where targets like Navarro and Bannon would make for crucial cooperating witnesses if they can be pressured into flipping. So why offer Navarro a deal, but apparently not Bannon?

For one thing, Bannon appears to be a much bigger criminal target than Navarro. Keep in mind that these contempt charges are small potatoes compared to charges like seditious conspiracy. Bannon has spent his contempt hearings trying and failing to find out if the DOJ has a larger criminal case against him.

Bannon and Navarro were the two key players in a plot they called the “Green Bay Sweep,” in which they tried to coerce Congress into illegally overthrowing the election. Our best guess is the DOJ sees Navarro as the more fragile of the two, and is looking to flip him against Bannon, so it can then use the threat of more serious charges to try to flip Bannon against Trump. But we’ll see.